How utterly strange have these Royals been this month? Beating the Yankees 17-8 (and leading 17-3 in the 9th) after looking limp and lifeless against the Devil Rays? Well, maybe an offense fueled by singles isn't so bad after all.

Of course the story will be about the Yankees getting blown out- but considering that this matchup featured a Royals team that scored 26 runs last week, and a Yankee's pitching staff that famously surrendered 22 runs to the Indians, maybe, in a surreal way, this wasn't a shocking result.

Still, it was a weird game. The Royals pounded out 16 singles, drew 8 (!!) walks and somehow scored 17 runs with only two extra-base hits, Buck's homer and double.

The heroes:

Angel Berroa: 5-5 . Berroa's post-demotion renaissance continues.
John Buck: 4-5, including the huge 3-run homer. (Did we mention he was part of the Beltran trade?)
Ruben Goaty: 3-5.

Brian Anderson: amazingly BA only surrendered 3 runs to the Yankees. Anderson pitched about as well as he could- one walk, no Ks, no homers, lots of hard hit balls getting caught. You mix it all together and once a month it looks OK the next morning. BA lowered his ERA to 5.94 in the win.

Can we have a moment of silence for Calvin Pickering's career? I'm not sure he hit quite well enough to earn a serious chance next season, although perhaps he'll get a chance. With the return of Grimace from the DL, Pickering will see fewer ABs... which is a damn shame.